Apollo Pepper

A combination of sweet and earthy flavors with fruity undertones from its Carolina Reaper parentage and earthier notes from Pepper X.

The Apollo Pepper is a blisteringly hot superhot chili created by Smokin’ Ed Currie at Puckerbutt Pepper Company in South Carolina as a deliberate cross between the Carolina Reaper and Pepper X. Little detailed information has been released about the fresh pepper itself beyond its extreme heat and parentage, but it has gained notoriety through its starring role in The Last Dab: Apollo hot sauce by Heatonist. This sauce uses fresh, powdered, and distilled forms of the Apollo pepper with minimal vinegar to deliver concentrated, unadulterated heat measuring 2.5 million SHU—hotter than the upper range of a Carolina Reaper. Reports describe its flavor as sweet and earthy, blending the fruity notes typical of the Reaper with earthier tones from Pepper X. Appearance is expected to resemble its parents: pod-like pods around 2.5 to 3 inches long, wrinkled and gnarled, ripening to red. Seeds are not available to the public, so most enthusiasts encounter it only through the commercial hot sauce. The pepper’s heat is described as unfathomably intense, requiring extreme caution when handling.

The Apollo Pepper was created by Smokin’ Ed Currie of Puckerbutt Pepper Company as a cross between the Carolina Reaper and Pepper X. It first gained widespread attention through its use in The Last Dab: Apollo hot sauce by Heatonist, which tests at 2.5 million SHU using multiple forms of the pepper.